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Dessert

Boston Ginger-bread

A sweet gingerbread dough made with flour, butter, molasses, eggs, baking soda, ginger, cinnamon, and milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Ginger and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,380 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Boston Ginger-bread

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the dough

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a bowl, rub the butter into the flour.

  3. Add the molasses, eggs, dissolved saleratus, ginger, cinnamon, and enough milk to form a dough.

  4. Roll out the dough into sheets and cut into desired shapes.

Bake

  1. Butter your baking tins and place the cut dough in them.

  2. Mix molasses with a little water and brush it over the cakes before baking.

  3. Bake in a moderate oven until done, being careful not to scorch.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Ginger + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Cinnamon + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Molasses + cinnamontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,928 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Flour
Forms the structure that holds the dough together as it bakes.
Butter
Rubbed into the flour to add tenderness and richness to the dough.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, dark colour and moisture to the gingerbread.
Eggs
Bind the dough and add structure and richness.
Saleratus (baking soda)
Reacts with the molasses to produce gas that helps the cakes rise.

The step that matters

Bake in a moderate oven until done, being careful not to scorch.. Molasses and sugars brown quickly, so the cakes can scorch on the outside before the centre is fully baked. Watching the bake and checking for doneness prevents a burnt surface with an undercooked middle.

Swap the ginger

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, butter, molasses, egg, cinnamon, milk):

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Cardamomfits better
  3. Clovefits better
  4. Gingerthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, butter, molasses, egg, cinnamon, milk. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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